Under the guise of promoting academic freedom and civil discourse, Ron DeSantis’ administration is suppressing drag shows, purging library books, and censoring content in AP African American Studies. Now, Florida’s self-styled “education governor” is promoting legislation to ensure “Florida’s public universities and colleges are grounded in the history and philosophy of Western Civilization” while banning critical race studies and courses dealing with gender and LGBTQ identities. Cuban Americans and Puerto Rican Floridians who handed Mr. DeSantis a landslide electoral victory for governor may want to think twice about whether their culture, their lives, and their experience counts as part of “Western Civilization.”

Author Archives: José Juan Villagrana
José Juan Villagrana is Assistant Professor of English and Comparative Literature at San José State and Assistant Professor of English at Santa Clara University beginning in 2023. He is a Public Voices Fellow with the Op-Ed Project and author of “Racial Apocalypse: The Cultivation of Supremacy in the Early Modern World.”